In California, new privacy, data protection rules could fuel lawsuits

California’s new privacy law could spur a rash of class action lawsuits against companies, officials warn.

The Recorder at law.com reports that the regulations, due to go into effect Jan. 1, 2020, “will bear more than a passing resemblance to the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, empowering Californians with more control over the way their data is collected, shared or viewed by companies on a daily basis.”

“A provision of the CCPA creates statutory damages for security breaches, and as a result Hirsch expects to witness a spike in California security breach class action suits,” the site reports. “Lawyers may want to consider incorporating a review of a client’s incident response plan into their CCPA prep work, he says.”